In today’s digital age, it is bewildering to note that many politicians are yet to appreciate the importance of SEO (Search engine optimization) and how they can manage their reputation on the internet. Many voters use the internet to get information relating to the candidates including their policies and backgrounds. If you are a candidate, it is absolutely critical that you monitor your online reputation and image. You also need to establish strategies for dealing with potential problems that may harm your candidacy. Here are several SEO for politicians strategies that work.

Take control of your name online

Running your own official website is the only sure proof way of communicating with voters and controlling your message. A website in your name is highly beneficial because the algorithms used by search engines give high priority to keywords that are also domain names. When a voter searches for your name using Google and the top results are from other websites, this may result in your message being in the hands of third parties who may have the potential of harming your message to the voters.

Create a blog

Since you want to represent your voters, they need to know that you care about their issues. This is where a blog will come in handy-where you write about these issues each day and share your views with them. You can even get other people to write on the blog but you attach your name to the postings.

Social media and authority sites

When it comes to SEO, Twitter and Facebook pages are ranked very highly. It is therefore crucial to set up a profile on these platforms. Wikipedia is also an authority site, so you can try to encourage a non-affiliated party (for purposes of neutrality) to write an article about you on it. Since websites run by educational institutions also carry high authority, you can offer to be a guest speaker at a school. This will get your site a link to the school’s website, therefore enhancing the ranking of your website.

Use relevant issues as keywords

You can also use keywords that are related to relevant issues to enhance your online visibility. You can create a micro site that answers general questions, for instance how to register as a voter in your location. Once voters find this information on your site, they will share it with others using social media platforms. This will increase traffic and boost the SEO ranking of your site.

Use real-time and fresh content

The popularity of social media has meant that search engines today give high priority to content that is fresh. Therefore when there is a trending issue, the faster you upload it on your site the higher the traffic. If you quickly upload newsworthy press releases or blog articles you will get increased traffic since more news feeds and websites will link to your site.This will significantly boost your SEO ranking.

Websites that are frequently updated are also given more priority by search engines. Try to get new content uploaded on your site as often as possible. You can also get links from other websites that get regularly updated. This will make your content fresh even if you have not put new content on your website.

Research about your competitors

It is important to do some online research and find out how your competitors are faring in terms of search traffic and engagement on social media platforms. You can use online tools such as Alexa to learn about traffic metrics for your rivals’ websites. These tools can also show the search terms that are giving them the most web traffic.